New Report Claims GM ‘Delayed Disclosure’ of Battery Safety Issues
- Posted on December 7, 2011 at 11:27am by
Becket Adams
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Remember when The Blaze reported this last month:
… a Chevy Volt caught fire a full three weeks after its lithium-ion battery was damaged in a government crash test, federal officials said Friday.
Adding the concern is the fact that is was no small fire. The fire was large enough to burn vehicles parked in the vicinity of the car…
Back when this story was originally published, it reported that an investigation by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) was started after it learned of the Volt’s exploding battery issue.
Also at the time, GM was doing all it could to calm understandably worried consumers.
“I want to make this very clear: the Volt is a safe car,” Jim Federico, GM’s chief engineer, said in an e-mailed statement according to Bloomberg. “We are working cooperatively with NHTSA as it completes its investigation. However, NHTSA has stated that based on available data, there’s no greater risk of fire with a Volt than a traditional gas-powered car.” ”
However, it appears that there was much more going on than either GM or NHTSA let on:
In June, General Motors learned from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration that a Chevrolet Volt caught fire three weeks after a test crash.
Not until NHTSA did additional testing on Volt batteries in November did GM disclose the potential risk — and tell owners, dealers and the public that it is critical to drain power from the battery pack immediately after a crash.
NHTSA, too, waited months to disclose possible fire hazards of the Volt. The agency crashed the Volt on May 12, and a fire on the vehicle broke out in June.
The agency first acknowledged the June fire on Nov. 11. And on Nov. 25, NHTSA announced it was opening a safety defect investigation to assess the Volt’s battery-related fire risks.
According to GM, they did not feel the need to disclose the exploding battery issue because the original fire was an isolated occurrence and happened some time after the vehicle was crashed, reports Autoguide.com.
“It’s kind of odd in many respects,” said GM spokesman Rob Peterson. “The question became: What was making this happen and what do we have to do?”
One of the reasons that the fires may have occurred is because NHTSA didn’t drain the battery after crash testing as it is standard procedure to empty the fuel tank on conventional gasoline powered vehicles, says to Clarence Ditlow, executive director for the Center of Auto Safety in Washington D.C.
Joan Claybrook, a former administrator at NHTSA believes part of the reason for the delay was the “fragility of Volt sales.”
“NHTSA could have put out a consumer alert, not to tell them [customers] for six months makes no sense to me,” she said.
But there may be a reason why they didn’t disclose this information. Back in November, when news of the exploding lithium batteries was finally released, GM’s Volt sales plummeted. GM was even forced to set up a program providing concerned Volt owners with free loaner vehicles (so far, 33 of roughly 5,000 customers have signed up).
Some analysts believe that both GM and NHTSA officials knew full well that declining sales would be the natural reaction if anyone found out about the exploding lithium batteries. Perhaps they were racing to find a way to ensure the public that the batteries were safe before they disclosed the information.
It would appear that as they were unable to accomplish the former, they were forced to perform the latter.
(h/t Weasel Zipper)
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WHITE-TX-POWER
Posted on December 9, 2011 at 2:58pmThat car should of caught on fire with him in it
Report Post »MarsBarsTru7
Posted on December 9, 2011 at 2:21pmNo responsible American should be buying anything from Government Motors.
Report Post »TakeBackUSA
Posted on December 9, 2011 at 10:54amI guess you don’t want to hang around the Volt after an accident. So now the government is “investigating” what the government already knew about the “thermal events” …aka…fires. It shouldn’t surprise anyone. Then-GM vice-chairman Bob Lutz was the head of the Volt project, and helped it survive when Obama decided to make cars. Something tells me that Ole’ “Maximum Bob” isn’t going to take any heat for this problem. In an interview with CNN’s Frank Sesnos for the special report “Out of Gas” on May 17, 2008, Lutz said that there were problems with the batteries. He said they were going to “plow ahead with the vehicle, and HOPE that the batteries catch up”. (his words)
The question is: did the batteries ever really “catch up”? Or did they just rush it along so Obama Motors could get it on the road?
Hmm…can you say Solyndra?…Cardinal Fasteners?…Obama is the kiss of death for these companies, if they ever had any future to begin with.
I’m biased against this car, as I am working on a non-government project that could replace it, but I see no sense in continuing to make the car. The mileage on the batteries is far lower than they promised, and as such, it is impractical as anything but a novelty to bring out on the weekends.
Report Post »theaveng
Posted on December 9, 2011 at 2:20pmThis is why Toyota and Honda don’t use lithium-ion. They use the much safer (and disposable) NiMH batteries in their hybrid cars. They hold about 67% as much energy as the Li-Ion but for a hybrid you don’t need that much energy.
Report Post »John the Doe
Posted on December 8, 2011 at 3:10pmSeeing the jack ass behind the wheel of the car you’d have to realize it is Gubment Motors, liar supreme.
Report Post »nilo
Posted on December 8, 2011 at 12:29pmHaste makes waste. In this case, I opine that GM hurried up and didn’t do diligent research in several aspects of this car.. Any one who would pay $40,000 for a 40 mile range electric car would have to be short on critical logic.
Report Post »the point
Posted on December 8, 2011 at 9:37amIf the truth is known , it was the federal government , not GM ,
Report Post »wntsmallgov
Posted on December 8, 2011 at 6:01amOf course they did, would expect anything less than GOVERNMENT MOTORS to protect obama
Report Post »Southernsoul
Posted on December 7, 2011 at 10:47pmDelayed the report because it may poorly influence sales, they should say.
Report Post »John 1776
Posted on December 7, 2011 at 9:13pmNot sure draining the battery would do a darn thing. Lithium itself burns when exposed to air. All you need is a crack in the casing to let some air in. Hard to be sure that won’t happen in a crash. We have seen this in laptop batteries, cell phone batteries, and even watch batteries. (Lithium) The battery assembly in the volt contains a large volume of it.
Report Post »valleyfever
Posted on December 7, 2011 at 8:03pmNHTSA might drain the fuel out after a gas car has been crash tested. But the average scrap yard to which your damaged VOLT might be towed probably hasn’t got the ability to drain the battery. Anybody who has seen how fast a battery can discharge when shorted understands that this is not a trivial problem. Smells like a cover-up to me.
Report Post »Sicialian Eyeball
Posted on December 7, 2011 at 7:35pmGM building unsafe junk?!!!!!! Does the Govt know this?
Report Post »jblovesAmerica
Posted on December 7, 2011 at 5:35pmLiberals do not care about safety.
Report Post »Fast & Furious
Volt Battery
GM&DCX Bailouts
whatever they think is important
Obama & Holder and their murderous minions
end game matters, not how you got there.
bama54m
Posted on December 7, 2011 at 5:10pmI saw a “volt” running in the rain,on I-79 yesterday with no lights and no wipers,,really safe vehicle,,run the lights and it stalls in heavy traffic,,LOL,,license plate said “doc” something or other,what a way to save the planet,,burn coal to power your car,,,didn’t that idea go out with the “Stanley Steamer”,,,what a joke ! Lets call it what it is now, the New “American Motors”
Report Post »We all remember the Rambler don’t we ?
Living In NYC
Posted on December 7, 2011 at 6:53pmHey, Hey…let’s not knock AMC!!!!
I still miss my first new car a 74 AMX, it got 9 mpg the day it was delivered! I thought was saving fuel when it finally got “broken in” and it got double digit mpg..10!!..,,But what the heck when you could go over 130 mph who cares. While blowing the eco fools of the 70′s in their Pintos, Vegas, Bugs and whatever off the road!
I know I am going miss the ablity to replace my 2008 V-8 Pontiac with a real General Motors car. But, I did replace my three other supercharged gas sucking Pontiacs with a couple of two new Fords with V-8′s and a F-250 with a V-10…all since Govt Motors! Maybe I will just have to store the last real General Motors V-8 Pontiac.
But I am still laughing at the eco fools of the 21st century driving coal fired Volts and other fossil fuel powered hybreds….gee I guess history does repeat itself.
Except for me am still driving a V-8 or bigger…with my Bible on the seat and my gun under it! Stll LMAO at the eco fools in the right lane with their OBAMA 2008 sticker on their bumper!
Report Post »TakeBackUSA
Posted on December 9, 2011 at 11:09am#Living In NYC,
You want the best?…! I recently had a test drive in the Cadillac CTS-V. It’s the fastest production sedan in the world. 0-60 in 3.9 sec. I was going 40 mph on a somewhat-isolated city street, and when I got the thumbs-up from the salesman, I punched it about half-way. I was up to 60 in a second-and-a-half! A vision-impaired friend in the backseat kind-of-yelled. It wasn’t a very long drive, but it was a fun, hot car. It’s a bit cramped in the back, but who cares!
Report Post »Cabo King
Posted on December 7, 2011 at 4:39pmboycott GM….
Report Post »Cabo King
Posted on December 7, 2011 at 4:37pmGM and GE the two worse companies on this planet
Report Post »I.Gaspar
Posted on December 7, 2011 at 4:35pmobama has recommended they just change the name. They can bring back the Firebird logo…or buy the rights to the name “Pinto” from Ford.
Report Post »Cabo King
Posted on December 7, 2011 at 4:34pmWe now call Gm Obamalet….
Report Post »yougottabekidding
Posted on December 7, 2011 at 3:28pmAnd this suprises everyone why? The Corrupt government covering up for the corrupt government.
I did get one little suprise recently. I decieded to remortgage recently and guess who it had to go through. FREDDIE and they want pictures of every room of the house, why?
Report Post »And guess who is a prime lender for Freddie! GMAC
I wonder if someone smarter then me can figure out what percentage of loans go to our union brothers and sisters.
AnAmerican111
Posted on December 7, 2011 at 3:07pmStopped buying GM‘s once OBUMA’s administration too over!
Report Post »Could not be happier with the VW and Lexus we purchased since then
AnAmerican111
Posted on December 7, 2011 at 3:05pmGovernment run. Government subsidized………………………….liars and cheats just like OBUMA and rest of his pathetic morons!
Report Post »thegreatcarnac
Posted on December 7, 2011 at 2:55pmObama and the US government were scamming everyone and trying to ruin a legitimate company at the same time. At the time obama took over GM he attacked Toyota. A few older people ran their cars into a tree or somethng and the rumor began that Toyota had s sticking accelerator problem. After the smoke cleared…there was NO accelerator sticking problem but that fact never quite made it out of the MSM. The damage had been done….they thought. The Chevy volt was supposed to be out there to give the Prius a run for it’s money. In truth..the volt was an engineering joke and had caused fires and worse. GM hid that fact as long as they could while still pushing the lie that Toyota had accelerator problems. You can tell by the way they do business that the government and obama own GM.
Report Post »elosogrande
Posted on December 7, 2011 at 2:50pmThe government should be forced to report every nickel of Taxpayer money that was invested in the Volt. It’s a piece of crap, it’s not safe, they can’t make it safe, it‘s GM’s fault and the fault of our incompetent and corrupt liberal government. Once again, we find out about another way they have pissed away billions of our tax dollars.
There can’t be any more excuses. It‘s not GW’s fault. America can no longer afford to have these people out on the streets. We need to start putting the buffoons in jail.
Report Post »AJAYW
Posted on December 7, 2011 at 1:54pmWhat else could you expect Obama has his hands in government motors policies.
Report Post »Ruler4You
Posted on December 7, 2011 at 1:43pmLet‘s not forget that GM is now ’government motors’. That means it has rules that don’t apply to the rest of us. Plus, if this had been released, what would that have done to GM stock when the government was trying to unload it?
Americans get scrod, once again. Thank you federal government.
Report Post »Apologist JD
Posted on December 7, 2011 at 3:01pmThe great thing here is that based on securities laws, there could be insider trading class action suits against the government (for selling based on inside information) and fraud/failure to disclose suits against GM (for failing to disclose material adverse information).
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